RjMitte

(S03E06) The word "pivotal" doesn't even begin to describe this episode. When it was over, I let out a "Jimmy H. Carter!" so loud that it freaked out my fiancee -- imagine another name with the initials "J.C." instead of "Jimmy Carter" and you'll get the idea.

(S03E03) One of the aspects of 'Breaking Bad' that amazes me week after week, and one of the things that makes it one of the most compelling shows on television, is this:

Intellectually, as you watch Walter White lie his way through his family's lives and the lives of everyone he comes in contact with, you know he's one of the biggest bastards on TV. And, also intellectually, you watch Skyler have to suffer through all of Walt's lies -- at least the ones she knows about -- and you know she's trying her best to protect herself and her children from someone who's become a monster she no longer recognizes.

But, here's the compelling part: No matter how rationally I think about the situation, I still don't know who to root for.

(S03E02) Last season, we had to wait until the end to see what the cold open was all about each week. This time around, the scary pair of bald Mexicans worked their way into the main story almost immediately, even if it's still unclear what their objective is. In fact, the climax at the White house that wrapped this episode had so much going on, it was almost overwhelming.

Vince Gilligan and company continue to take things slow, after the bombshell revelation that Walter laid on Skyler last week. Walter's clearly in a state of crisis, and he's becoming unraveled completely because of it. He's without direction and focus. Everything he did for the past two seasons he did for his family; albeit misguided and taking things way, way too far.

He at least had a purpose and there was always a goal behind the production of meth: making enough money to keep his family going after he died ... then to pay for his treatment and surgery ... then to pay for Holly, the new and unexpected baby. Now, he's lost everything and he's lost in response.

In season two of 'Breaking Bad,' viewers saw Anna Gunn's character of Skyler White go from long-suffering wife of cancer-patient-slash-meth-maker Walter White to a person who is starting to have her own moral dilemmas.

But right at the start of the third season, Skyler's world gets turned upside down. I can't say more without spoiling things, which is why I postponed posting the interview I did with Anna Gunn in January until after the season three premiere aired. Gunn and I talk about the first episode bombshell and how her character reacted. We also talk about what might be in store for Skyler and son Walt Jr. (RJ MItte) in season three.

Our friends at AOL TV also spoke to Gunn recently, if you want to find out more about what's in store for Skyler.

Not sure why this surprised me; non-disabled actors have been playing disabled characters for decades. Maybe it's because McHale handles his wheelchair so well, or because Glee seems to be pretty proud of its not-calling-attention-to-itself brand of diversity. Maybe I just figured that, in 2009, hiring a disabled actor to play a disabled character wasn't a big deal.

(S02E01) Three hundred and sixty-four days after the first season finale, the second season of Breaking Bad finally began last night (Damn you, writers strike!). While we only got seven episodes last year, the show still made a huge impact on the television landscape, primarily by being just amazingly produced and acted. The action and tone pick up here as if we've never been away, and despite a year since new episodes, it feels like only last week that we first saw Tuco go ballistic and viciously beat his own man.

Of course, if it had been last week then I doubt we'd have rewound the scene and replayed it in its entirety. Still, it was a nice reminder of just how crazy and unpredictable Tuco is. And it was the problem of Tuco that pretty much drove the entirety of the main plot tonight. It says something as to how perfectly disturbed Raymond Cruz portrays Tuco that despite being in the episode only during two sequences, his presence hovered over every moment.

(S01E05) This episode served as a bridge in our larger story to the next chapter of both Jesse and Walt's lives. In the previous installment, Walt withdrew from the sordid world of drug trafficking and focused on his family, revealing his cancer and looking at the varying options available to him. Meanwhile, his erstwhile partner Jesse had a bad drug reaction and sought refuge in the home of his parents, which didn't turn out as well as he had hoped. Here they both continued their efforts to move on with their lives, to varying degrees of failure.